The present invention relates in general to video games and in particular to various embodiments of playing video games with other video game players over an ad-hoc wireless network.
Playing video gaming is rapidly becoming a favorite pastime for individuals of all ages. Video games have been developed over the last few decades to include games that individuals can play with or without the interaction with others. For those games that are designed for individual play, a user may use a game consol or handheld video game device to play the video game. The user selects a particular game, and instructs the video game device to play with the user. If the user wants to play with others in a multi-user mode, typically, the other users must connect a joy-stick or some other device into the user's consol to initiate play. Unfortunately, for many users connecting to another user's consol is impractical, especially if there are more than two or three users wanting to play together.
The video-game industry has provided some solutions for multi-user video game play. For example, computer users can log onto a web-based video game and play against other users from around the world. Unfortunately, for many users playing an online video game may be inconvenient as they may not have access to the Internet, may be traveling, or for that matter, may want to play a video game with another individual but may not want to engage another player via the World-Wide Web.
In other multi-player video game configurations, the computer will often substitute computer generated and controlled characters for other players. Unfortunately, for the player the computer generated characters are often predictable and easily distinguished from the other video-game player's characters.
Recently, some video games have been developed that operate with cell phones over a BLUETOOTH network, for example, some games allow two players to play chess using a BLUETOOTH link. Unfortunately, these types of conventional video games do not work well as the interface is limited and the user must be in close proximity of the user to be used.
Therefore, what is needed is a system and method that allows a user to play video games with others either locally, or via a network such as the Internet, that is simple, cost effective, and that provides a challenging multi-character video-game environment.